


In Blood And Fire

by Roverlord



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate History, Blood and Violence, Brainwashing, Byronic Heroes & Heroines, Child Soldiers, Communism, Disturbing Themes, Holocaust, Mental Health Issues, Nazis, No Sex, POV Alternating, Period Typical Attitudes, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Propaganda, Psychopathology & Sociopathy, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Religious commentary, Slow To Update, Supernatural Elements, Violence, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-05-19 02:35:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19347784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roverlord/pseuds/Roverlord
Summary: "I just couldn't stand by and see people destroyed. I did what I could, what I had to do, what my conscience told me I must do."~ Oskar Schindler----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------It was 1938, in Germany.In the wake of the Kristallnacht and growing tension across the globe, Jochen, a boy born in München during The Great War, hides in a church after a failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler.It's there he meets Johann, another man on the run. They both have the same goal: Ending the nazi rule and restoring Germany's freedom.





	1. God With You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm testing this one out to see if people like it. I already have plans for this, but i'm not sure if i can pull off something that complex. So, please comment.
> 
> One of the things that gave me the inspiration was a song titled "The Riddle" from The Scarlet Pimpernel.

The gravestones stood silently, rown upon row like soldiers long forgotten. On some of them grew moss and the carved letters were lost to time, while the others had recently been broken down in the hands of hate. Beyond them, upwards the hill, lied the church.

The stars were hiding from SS-Sturmbannführer Moritz Brenne behind the clouds as he knocked on the heavy door and commanded the inhabitant to open it. The young boy who answered the door became pale as a ghost upon seeing the visitors, and called the priest's name in panic, while Brenne's troops barged in.

 

The priest, an old man by the name Horst Zimmer, stepped out of a smaller side door, greeting the officer and asking, with forced politeness, what was Brenne doing here at such a late hour. Brenne left the question unanswered and ordered his soldiers do a search. Another question he answered, of what he was looking for: A man named Jochen Sachs, guilty of treason.

Horst could do nothing as he watched the SS troopers break nearly everything and turn everything else upside down, his property and also that of the church clattering to the floor. He was sweating from fear, but tried to look merely dismayed due to Brenne's reputation for hawking for any weaknesses. He didn't know what Jochen had done, but hadn't seen the boy for nearly two weeks. Still he had some idea of where Jochen was, but Horst had more to hide than this knowledge.

 

A group of ragged, starved people lay huddled together under the floor, not daring to take a breath as they listened to the creaks and steps in the floor above them, Brenne barking orders all across the room. Some were sitting completely still, some clutching to religious symbols, some quietly crying out of fear. One of them, ghostly pale but not due to fear, was holding onto a loaded shotgun, hands trembling. He had never shot anything in his life and knew his chances against the rifle-wielding men were extremely slim.

As Brenne was standing right above the refugees Horst was growing desperate, despite the officer maintaining his calm and dignified front, for Horst knew it was just that: a front. The man apparently heard something and stopped on his tracks. Horst tried to keep himself from shaking as Brenne drew his luger. He had thought he was going to be shot, but Brenne instead shot through the floor. Once, twice, five times.

Two first bullets barely missed, but the third and fourth one ripped though the curly-haired boy's palm and foot, seeming to pierce at least one artery. Another man - no, a boy - was trying to keep him still and quiet despite the pain he must've been in, and desperately attempted to stop the bleeding. The pale man heard Brenne turn around and tried to cover the boys with his own body, the fift bullet piercing his cheek but not sinking in. He held his face tightly, to stop the blood and noises of pain from escaping.

Every soldier had whipped around at the gunshots and those in the other rooms had returned with running steps, all falling silent at Brenne's voiceless command as he listened for any noises with a keen ear.

 

After a good five minutes, he ordered a soldier to look in the holes for possible bodies. The soldier complied, but saw nothing as it was extremely dark and all the refugees were lying under a black blanket, so he told his officer there was nothing in there.

Brenne, who already had every other place in the building turned upside down in his quest for Jochen, had enough, his cover of calm sophistication starting to slip. Horst tried to distract him from his task by talking to him, but the man proceeded to point his gun at Horst's organ player, Erwin, demanding for Horst to and over the traitor.

 

Horst's cover of calmness was slipping too as the soldiers grapped him by his arms, betraying pure fear as he swore to both God and Brenne himself that the man they were looking for was not in there. The Gestapo agent who had entered with the SS officer and blended in the background up until now, told Horst he had the count of five to rethink his answer.

Despite Horst's pleas and Erwin's tearful begging, the number five eventually came, and Brenne pulled the damned trigger. The bulled pierced through Erwin's head, taking a splash of blood and brain with it, and Brenne let the body drop on the floor with a thud.

The soldiers dropped Horst, who rushed to the boy's side, but Erwin was already dead. Brenne let out a dark, dry chuckle and told no one in particular that it seemed like Horst was telling the truth all along. He then proceeded to turn around and walk down the aisle, the moonlight filtering through the stained-glass windows and his blonde hair, making it look like the demon of a man had a halo. The Gestapo man, whose face brought to Horst's mind a cockroach, walked in the shadow after him, the black-clad soldiers following like dogs, leaving Horst to cradle the dead boy in his arms.

 

Everybody under the floor had frozen at the last gunshot ringing in the night. It hadn't been aimed down at them. The echoing footsteps left the room, and it became deadly silent. After what felt like and maybe was hours, Horst limped in through the hidden entrance, his old wound making his step unsteady and his face doused by tears he had tried to wipe in vain. He called the pale man's name,  _Johann_. Johann stood shakily, asking what had happened.

Erwin, Horst told him, was dead and the Gestapo was suspecting Horst. They had to move at nightfall, he had contacted another person who harbored refugees, but this person only had room for a few. One of them would have to wait. Johann, naturally, offered to stay behind, but Horst was unconfident. Johann was specifically wanted, for several hundred deutschmarks at that, and his albinism made him immediately recognizable. Johann tried to reason the lives of the boys had more value than his, and he could find himself another place in order to keep Horst safe, but none of the boys would stay behind, even if any of them tried to volunteer. Eventually, he and Horst found an agreement, but Horst wanted him to stay in the church, it was more dangerous out there in the open.

 

At nightfall, Johann bid his farewells to Otto, Jacob, and David, as they had come a long way together, and then the boys followed Horst's female friend through the graveyard, disappearing in the ghostly night mist.

" _Got mit dir._ "


	2. Heil Hitler

Jochen could remember the lyrics of  _Wenn alle untreu werden_  clearly, if in slightly mixed up order, as he sang the old imperial patriot song in his head very often, when he was scared. Like he was right now.

 

> _You stars are our witnesses, calmly looking down_

The Gods were watching over them all from afar as they, Jochen Sachs and his friend Marius, were walking towards the hotel room of Adolf Hitler. Jochen was wearing the uniform of a bellhop because that's what he was, while Marius was stalking the shadows behind him, an SA uniform under a civilian coat. Jochen was holding a loaded gun under the food tray.

 

> _When all brothers fall silent and worship false idols._

Whoever wrote this song must've been a prophet. Their country had fallen to dark times, Hitler was this false god Germany was worshipping, and those who didn't worship Hitler like a god stayed quiet or were silenced. And nobody else gave a shit.

 

> _We will never break our word, never become villains  
>  _

Even if Jochen and Marius were succesful, they propably wouldn't make it out alive, Marius said he had already thought out his last words. They could succeed in killing Hitler, yes, but somebody else could rise in the man's place. That would be a fight for other men, Jochen had a gut feeling and it wasn't good, but Marius was right. They could not let Germany fall into darkness, the German people had already lost so much, he couldn't let them lose their shreds of humanity.

 

> _We will preach and speak of the holy German Empire._

Jochen would enter first, with Marius close behind. He'd go as close to Hitler as he could, and pull the trigger. There would be several soldiers in the room, there would be no escape for the duo, so the two could only try to face their deaths with dignity. Marius would say "Long live holy Germany, long live freedom". Those were the last words he had chosen.

 

> _You, o dream of glory, shall never grow old on us_

Jochen and Marius each had a different dreams of glory than the Nazis, Marius' dream was order and stability, and Jochen's dream was peace and freedom. The duo were only a corner away from the door, other side of which Hitler's yelling could be heard from. For a brief moment, Jochen doubted, and casted a glance at the solemn Marius, who seemed to hold onto his distant sadness of the last few days. Then he walked around the corner to the quite literal death's door, at sides of which were standing two armed guards.

 

> _Once it will again become clear to all our brothers' spirits  
>  They will return to The Source in love and loyalty_

They were let in by the shorter guard after explaining they were bringing  _Führer_  his dinner, and Jochen casted another glance at Marius, trusting the another boy to protect him.

He carefully looked around the room.There were guards on this side too and it was very dark, the dim evening light shimmering through the dust floating in the air. There were soldiers standing at attention, a few officers standing up around the table, and then there was Hitler himself, back facing the door and fingrs pointing something about the papers on the table out to the generals. Absence of light truly was the absence of God and the domain of Satan. Not that neither Jochen nor Marius believed in the Christian God, but the symbolics were greatly fitting.

Almost red eyes adapted to the dim lighting, Jochen started slowly walking towards the smaller table, the tray shaking lightly in his hands and sweating fingers grasping the gun until they found the handle and the trigger. He could feel Marius' gaze on him when he started lowering the tray, and drew a deep breath, remembering the lyrics of another old song.

 

> _Take it easy German brothers, every coward be a hero  
>  Faithful hearts will see each other again, farewell to this world_

Revitalized by the song about a fight for freedom, Jochen loudly slammed the tray down and drew his luger at a blinding speed, pointing it at the monster in the guise of a man.

" _Heil Hitler_ " he hissed bitterly, making everybody turn at him and freeze in place for a split second.

The moment he fired the weapon, he could hear somebody yelling at him, calling him a traitor. Marius grapped his wrist and yanked it upwards, making the bullet fly past Hitler, and slammed Jochen to the floor, fighting to wrestle the gun out of his hands.

Jochen hung onto his luger with his life and, too shocked to defend himself, covered his face and throat from Marius' boots, his mind racing wildly and his breath wheezing from the struggle. He had trusted Marius, was he one of them?? Why did he do this to Jochen??

 The man Jochen had thought of as a brother lifted him by the collar and yelled in his face, his own one red with fury, calling him a traitor again. Technically Jochen  _was_  a traitor, but if this be a treason...

 

The soldiers were reacting swiftly, but Marius, for about a blink, locked eyes with Jochen, mouthing the words  _"tut mir leid", 'i'm sorry',_  before loudly telling him to die and tossing him at the closed window. It shattered from the momentum, shards raining down to the empty street. Jochen let out an incoherent scream of shock, falling down until he crashed into the cold cobblestone street, breaking the wrist of his right arm. For about five seconds, he laid there in a puddle of his own blood until, upon hearing the SS guards taking to the street around the corner, forced himself up.

As he dashed towards the familiar alleys clutching his hand, he could hear one of the guards noticing him and calling out to the others. Jochen barely dodged the rifle fire into the alley and kept on running, knowing that the shadows couldn't save him now. He ran until he was lost, but his pursuers still were just a corner away. That's when he spotted an open manhole, in which he dove and swiftly pulled the lid on. He held his breath until the beat of the boots was far gone, and then scratched a match against the wall.

 

The sewer was dark and narrow, let alone filled with grimy water which smelled like death, and he had no slightest idea of direction, but he had to move quickly. There were only two ways to turn, so he chose the direction where he had been running away from. He would need to lay low for a long while now. It wasn't like he could hide in plain sight, not with red hair, the color was far too rare to not stand out. The church would be his best bet for the start, Horst hated the Nazis too and Jochen knew there was a hidden cellar somewhere in the church grounds.

He wandered on for hours until nightfall, when the noises of the world stopped, at which he waited for some time more until pushing open the cover above him. The street was deserted, the only form of life were flying bugs swarming beneath a streetlight. After determining his location, Jochen come to the conclusion he'd be in safety faster if he used the footpath in the park, and hastened his pace, eyes darting around the darkness surrounding him.


End file.
